


not a saint

by AmaranthBlue



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Blackwatch Era, Car Chases, Character Development, Character Study, Conflict Resolution, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jesse McCree Has ADHD, Problems with authority
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-06
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-24 02:04:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21330460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmaranthBlue/pseuds/AmaranthBlue
Summary: Reyes swears, and Jesse laughs—the windows are rolled down, and the night air is rushing through his hair, thick with the scent of honest to god freedom, a hint of a memory of what life was like before the man sitting next to him snatched it all away.“Pull over.” Reyes never once raises his voice—Jesse wonders if that’s a tactic to keep himself intimidating. No one in power ever ought to yell in order to be listened to. “Before you blow this whole operation.”Jesse’s never been real good at doing what he’s told. He shoots a grin over at him and accelerates, watching the little needle roll past 50, 60, 70. “Settle down, old man. I’ll get you your damn gunrunners.”Jesse McCree's first mission with Blackwatch doesn't quite go according to plan.
Relationships: Jesse McCree & Reaper | Gabriel Reyes
Comments: 8
Kudos: 63





	not a saint

First day out in the field, and it’s all gone to hell. 

It was supposed to be easy—something to help him get his feet wet without too much stress, but their intel was shit, it turned out. They weren’t moving the guns tomorrow, it was tonight, and he and Reyes had to sit in their goddamn car and watch a semi-truck full of smuggled weapons slip on by. 

It wasn’t so much the thought that they were “bad guys” that got Jesse all riled about it. Because he practically _ was _ them, a year or so ago, and he still felt sympathetic for them. He’s not been turned into a brainwashed dog quite yet, even if Reyes keeps trying to emphasize that they’re _ helping _ people. 

No, the thing that got him riled was that he had been outsmarted. By a bunch of assholes that had only popped up on the radar after Deadlock bit the dust, that’d taken advantage of the power vacuum they’d left, and maybe that made them smart, but Jesse’s had a year to lick his wounds and let the raw fury congeal into a more focused rage, one that didn’t rise to the surface near so often. 

_ Except _ when he’d been made a fool of. 

His grip tightens on the wheel, knuckles turned white, and Reyes’s eyes burn into the side of his head. “Let them go. We’ll get them another time.”

He’s angry, because this is his first fucking chance to show he’s not a mistake, that he doesn’t belong in a prison cell, that he deserves to be free.

And these fucking vultures are going to take it from him. 

“McCree,” Reyes warns, his own voice tightly strung, like he knows. He _ knows _ where this is going. 

Jesse slams the gear shift into drive and the tires screech and the engine roars and their heads slam against the back of the seat but Jesse doesn’t falter, not even once. 

Reyes swears, and Jesse laughs—the windows are rolled down, and the night air is rushing through his hair, thick with the scent of honest to god freedom, a hint of a memory of what life was like before the man sitting next to him snatched it all away. 

“Pull over.” Reyes never once raises his voice—Jesse wonders if that’s a tactic to keep himself intimidating. No one in power ever ought to yell in order to be listened to. “Before you blow this whole operation.”

Jesse’s never been real good at doing what he’s told. He shoots a grin over at him and accelerates, watching the little needle roll past 50, 60, 70. “Settle down, old man. I’ll get you your damn gunrunners.” 

It doesn’t take long for the grunts to notice they’re being followed, and none too stealthily—they speed up, and so does Jesse, a safe enough distance back that they can’t try anything. “You gonna shoot them, or what?” He drawls, like it’s the most casual thing in the world. 

Reyes gives him a pointed look, but there’s no use in arguing. They’re in it now, for better or worse. He pulls his gun from his holster, taking aim at the semi ahead of them, and squeezes off a single round. The back right tire pops, and the semi sways, but it’s not yet down. 

Jesse catches on, though. He drifts into the other lane and, as if on cue, a chorus of horns honk at him. He’s certain more than a few middle fingers are raised in his direction. Reyes has taken aim at the front tire, but he’s hesitating—watching the road, waiting, waiting, waiting—

“They’re gonna get away!” Jesse snaps. “Fuckin’ shoot ‘em already!”

Reyes doesn’t take his advice, not that Jesse expected he would, and waits until the roads are clear enough to fire off two rounds at the front tire. 

It bursts, a black rubber flower blooming, and there’s a moment of silence before the semi twists, sharp, like some giant beast slamming hard into the dirt. It can’t stop itself before it begins to roll down the steep hill beside the road. Metal screeches, and it wails, and it falls silent. 

Jesse slams the brakes, spins the wheel, tires squealing, and through a combination of partly skill and mostly luck the two of them are saved from the same fate, overlooking the smoking wreck of a semi from a bird’s eye view. 

He looks over at Reyes, and gives a lazy grin. 

The sound of bullets pinging against the back window makes it disappear real fast, though, and Jesse doesn’t even need Reyes to tell him to _ drive, just fucking drive _ before he’s burning rubber. 

“Lose them,” is all the instruction Reyes gives before he’s cocking his gun again and twisting around in his seat to fire at the three cars that are starting to gain on them, as the back window slowly turns to spider web fractures. Jesse does as he’s told, for once, because he really can’t complain about an order like that. 

If he had his bike, this would be far easier—smaller target, and he could weave in and out of traffic, use the other cars as cover as he slipped away into the chaos, but he’s stuck in this piece of shit with glass that was supposedly bulletproof but clearly isn’t. 

The glass cracks. 

There’s a violent spray of red mist, like spray paint, and Reyes inhales sharply, lurching forward until the seatbelt snags. 

Jesse spins the wheel and they go speeding down a side street, wheels protesting all the while. Horns blare as they shoot through an intersection, and a pick up truck just barely brakes in time to keep from colliding, but Jesse doesn’t flinch. 

His heart is pounding, and it’s all he can hear—in his head, in his ears, down to his fingertips he can feel the blood pulsing, ebbing and flowing. The horns fade away. The shouts of outraged drivers, the scream of tires skidding on the asphalt, the bullets flying, all gone quiet. All that remains is his hands on the wheel and the road stretched out in front of him. 

He breathes, slow. Inhale. Exhale. 

Reyes is grabbing at his own shoulder, hissing something sharp that Jesse knows isn’t meant for him, and a bullet tears through what’s left of the window and buries itself in the stereo speaker. 

Through the dulled silence, there’s an alarm ringing. A bell, cutting clear through his mind, and Jesse zeroes in on it, eyes snagging on the flashing red lights of a railroad crossing. 

_ That’s _ his way out. 

His pulse matches the ringing of the bell and he accelerates, faster and faster and faster and the train is roaring like the blood roars in his ears, racing to the finish, louder and louder and louder as gunfire strikes against the back of their car, like the ticking of a clock, and he can hear Reyes yelling something indecipherable but it doesn’t matter, because the railroad is under their wheels and the car jumps, the train looming over them, headlights piercing through the darkness, and there’s the unmistakable sound of fiberglass crunching and they’re spinning out across the road, white-knuckled grip on the wheel until— 

They’re halfway off the ground. Two wheels in the air, and everything is frozen for a few precious seconds that stretch on for eternity, a world without gravity, until the pendulum swings and they slam to the ground, bouncing with the impact. 

Jesse exhales. 

There’s blood trickling down the side of his face—he’d slammed into the window as they spun, and he’s sure there’ll be a line of bruises from where the seatbelt caught and dug into him. Copper on his tongue, too. He must have bitten it. 

Reyes fades into existence next to him, breathing just as hard. Whether it’s from the near death experience or the bullet in his shoulder, it really doesn’t matter. 

The train is still blaring.

Neither of them speak. 

Quietly, methodically, Jesse puts his hands on the wheel again and the car starts sputtering off down the road, groaning as they go. They were hit. Not too bad, but Jesse wouldn’t be too surprised if they needed to ditch this car for another one before they got back to the safe house. 

The drive back is silent, aside from the groaning engine and their heavy breathing. Jesse tries to turn the radio on, but the bullet that landed in the speaker means everything sounds warped and ugly, and it doesn’t take long sitting in that for him to click it off. 

But they make it back in one piece. Somehow. 

Jesse pulls up to the apartment complex where they’d been hiding out most of the day, stepping out and hurrying around to help Reyes out of the car. He can’t tell how bad the wound is—blood has soaked through the back of his shirt. “You okay?” 

Reyes nods his head once, but still leans on Jesse to get into the small apartment, holding his shoulder.

He nudges the door shut with his foot, and Reyes sinks into a chair, peeling off his body armor, his hoodie, his shirt, until the angry red wound in his shoulder is practically dripping blood down his back. 

There’s an unexpected sort of shame that rises in Jesse’s throat when he sees it. He hadn’t shot Reyes himself, not like he tried to a year ago, but it’s still his fault. His impatience, his anger, his impulsiveness. 

He doesn’t apologize, though, just pulls up a chair and grabs the travel size bottle of whiskey he’d smuggled along and hid in his duffel bag, and Reyes’s eyebrows shoot up. “How’d you get that?”

Jesse doesn’t falter. He’s used to this kind of questioning; it doesn’t scare him anymore, and he takes it in stride as he sets his hand on Reyes’s shoulder to keep him still. “Nolasco.” 

“Why’s Nolasco giving booze to an eighteen year old?” There’s only a sharp breath when Jesse pours it out over the wound, the barest hint of muscles tensing. 

“‘Cause he lost a bet.” 

“And what bet was that?”

“Beat his score in the shooting range.” He caps the bottle and tries to hand it to Reyes, but Reyes just sets it on the desk next to them. 

Jesse nods to it, but keeps on, grabbing the shirt that Reyes had dropped to tear strips out of it as quick as he can. “Only painkiller we got.”

Reyes shakes his head, a regretful smile on his face. “Can’t get drunk. SEP upped my metabolism—alcohol poisoning gets filtered right out.”

If that ain’t a tragedy. Jesse snorts in response, wrapping the first strip around the wound and tying it off. “Never?”

“Not unless I try _ very _ hard.” Reyes shifts slightly, turning his head to look at Jesse with a scrutinizing look. “Didn’t I check your bag for contraband?”

“Yep.” Jesse gives him a self-satisfied smile and wraps a few more strips around the wound, making sure they all lay flat and that it’s not too tight. The motions are close to second nature—he spent hours practicing on horrifyingly realistic dummies before he got field-certified. “You got anythin’ else?” 

Reyes doesn’t answer for a moment, staring at him, and it takes a moment for Jesse to realize he’s staring at him—the cut he’s got on his forehead. “I’m fine—let me see that?” Reyes points his chin at it. 

Now that he’s thinking about it, he can feel the warm slickness on the side of his face. Jesse touches his cheek and his hand comes away bloody, and he scowls, wiping it off on his jeans. “Yeah, whatever.” 

He doesn’t need his help to deal with it—the only reason he helped Reyes get patched up was because he wouldn’t have been able to reach it by himself, and that’s it. That, and maybe he felt guilty. But Jesse sure as hell doesn’t need his help for this. 

Maybe Reyes knows that. Maybe that’s why he’s offering. Another opportunity for some bullshit speech or lecture. 

Regardless, Jesse drops back into the chair, and Reyes gets to his feet, rolling the shoulder that’d just been wrapped up with a grimace. After a quick look around the apartment, he disappears into the bathroom.

It’s not like it bothered him that much. Reyes was a super soldier, practically, and he’s almost guaranteed to have had much worse wounds; that was obvious from the scars stretching over his torso and even his face, some much uglier than the neat little round scar that his new bullet wound would become in a few weeks. 

But Jesse still felt guilt gnawing away at him. 

He shoves that thought away when Reyes come out of the bathroom with a damp washcloth, and doesn’t waste any time pushing his hair out of the way and wiping the blood off his face. 

Jesse can’t even attempt to hide his scowl. He doesn’t much care for him being this close, up in his face, but he’ll put up with it.

“Why’d you go after them?” The question isn’t angry; it’s deceptively conversational, and Jesse finds himself waiting for the catch, for the hint of cold fury in his tone, for the spark of pain that’s sure to come. 

It doesn’t. It never does, at least not with Reyes, not yet. But he still expects it to. 

“They were gonna get away,” he says flatly. “Figured they shouldn’t.”

“You went against my orders.” Reyes leans back, reaches for what’s left of the whiskey to pour out on his washcloth, then carefully presses it against Jesse’s forehead. 

He winces, sharp with the memory of the last time he did this with someone—just before Blackwatch swept down on the Gorge. “And?”

“And I’d like to know your reasoning.” He meets his eyes, and Jesse’s frustrated to realize he can’t read him. 

There isn’t any reasoning. Aside from the fact that Jesse was angry and wanted to take it out on them, he didn’t have any reason to go after them. Didn’t have any reason not to listen to Reyes’s orders, aside from not giving a shit. 

So he doesn’t answer. 

Reyes pulls back, inspecting the cut, and lays the washcloth back on the desk. “Won’t need stitches for that, it’s small enough.” He doesn’t get up, though, apparently intent on having some kind of lecture about this. “McCree,” he says, watching him. “Why’d you go against my orders?”

“I don’t know,” he mutters.

Since their little first aid bonding moment is done, Jesse gets to his feet, picking up the whiskey and scowling when he sees there’s half an inch left inside. He throws it back into his bag anyway. 

“You don’t know?” Reyes repeats, not quite incredulous, still putting on a show of some kind of paternal bullshit. 

“I just—_did it, _ alright?” His frustration is clear in his tone, and Jesse digs through his bag for where he’s hidden his cigarettes in his socks. He’s eighteen now, and Reyes doesn’t have the grounds to take them, but he still hides them away. And after the night he’s had, he’s aching for a smoke. “I didn’t think about it. I just—” Jesse cuts himself off, scowling. 

A beat passes before Reyes speaks again, just as calm as ever. “Just an impulse?”

He can’t find his lighter. It must’ve slipped out into the bottom of his bag and he’s about to rip the damn thing apart just to find it, or start yelling at Reyes. The latter’s not an option. He grits his teeth and yanks open the inner pocket, and the lighter’s right where he put it yesterday morning. Of course it is. “I need a smoke break.” It’s not a question. Not even asking for permission.

“Take your time,” Reyes says, annoyingly unaffected. His eyes are still burning into him, like they always do, but there’s no anger behind it. “We’ll continue this when you get back.” 

Jesse can hear the implicit words. _ Calm yourself down. Come back with a level head. We’re talking about this, whether you like it or not. _

His hand balls into a fist around the lighter, and he all but storms out the door, slamming it shut behind him. 

Piece of shit. 

Jesse settles himself against the wall and takes his time to pull a cigarette out, instead staring out at the road. He doesn’t see it, not really—he’s already stuck in his head, rolling the cigarette between his fingers, trying to figure out just what in the hell he’s going to say when Reyes asks again.

Is it an apology he wants? Because he’s never gonna get that, not in a million years. 

His _ reasoning. _ Whatever—he’s just gonna get punished anyway, no matter what he says. It doesn’t matter why, it just matters that he didn’t listen, and that’s all Reyes needs to send him to some dark cell where he’s never gonna see the sun again.

Jesse finally lights his cigarette. It’s a cheap brand, all he had the pocket change for when he realized he’d run out, and that just pisses him off more. He never had to settle for shit like this before. 

The sky is starting to slowly lighten, from the deep black empty of stars to the darkened, bruised sort of purple that comes before the dawn, and Jesse watches it quietly. Too much light pollution to see any stars in the city, and it makes him ache for how things used to be—when he could pull over on the side of the road and sit in the truck bed of their pick up truck, when he and Ashe could spend hours talking and stargazing like they were the only ones in the world. 

Now he’s stuck at a shitty safe house disguised as an apartment with Gabriel fucking Reyes, of all people. The war hero people named their kids after. The war hero that practically forced him to turn traitor. 

Jesse knows he fucked up—maybe if it’d paid off, if Reyes hadn’t got shot, if they hadn’t had to leave a truck full of guns for the local cops to find, Reyes would let it slide. But, fuck. He can’t fix this, he can’t go back in time, and he can’t escape this. 

Maybe if the car wasn’t so fucked. If he trusted it to make it another ten miles, he might climb in, drive off and run away like he does best, go track down Ashe, wherever she landed after the dust settled. 

He _ could. _There’s nothing stopping him from stealing another car. 

The cigarette’s close to finished, and Jesse grinds it out on the brick wall behind him, dropping it into the ashtray. Whole place is already littered with cigarette butts and food wrappers, but it’s habit. No running away from this. 

Doesn’t mean he can’t stall a little longer. 

He lingers outside for another few minutes, bouncing between approaches to take—apologize, or keep getting angry and snappy, until Reyes takes the hint and drops the topic and just announces his punishment. 

Still not apologizing. 

Jesse bites the bullet and heads back inside, shutting the door behind himself with a much quieter click.

In the time he was outside, Reyes had cleaned up. The blood, towels, and ruined clothes had simply disappeared without a trace. Reyes had found a new shirt, too, though the shape of the makeshift bandages is still visible beneath it. 

He’s talking on the phone with someone, pacing across the room. Whatever it is, he’s certainly not enjoying it. When he sees Jesse step inside, he holds a finger up and mouths _ one minute. _

Whatever. Jesse makes his way over to his bag again, tucking away the cigarettes and lighter, idly listening along to the end of the conversation.

“I completely understand where you’re coming from,” Reyes says, in a voice that doesn’t sound all that empathetic. “Of course.” 

There’s a brief pause, and Jesse can almost make out the voice on the other end of the phone, though not a single word of it. 

Reyes pinches the bridge of his nose. “Make it happen. Call me back when it’s done. Understood?” He turns away from Jesse, waits another moment, then hangs up, setting his phone face down on the desk. 

There’s a sort of heaviness to him, Jesse notices. Like the moment Reyes hung up, a weight settled onto his shoulders, dragging him down. Though his back is to him, he looks almost exhausted. 

Just as quickly, it disappears, and Reyes turns back toward him, leaning back leisurely against the desk. 

Neither of them speak. 

And it takes what feels like forever before Reyes crosses his arms, takes a breath, and says, “Why do you think I recruited you?”

The question is nowhere near what he expected to come out of his mouth—he thought it’d be consequences, or simply repeating the first question and pressing for an answer once more. 

It’s like his throat closes up. Jesse doesn’t know how to answer, how to give him what he wants, and he stands there for a long moment, unable to speak. Say something, _ anything. _

“I’m a good shot,” he says finally, but he knows that’s not the answer Reyes is digging for. Reyes isn’t digging for an answer at all, really—he’s just preparing to give him some speech, probably about all his _ potential _ or how much they’re alike. The thought almost makes him scowl. 

“You are.” Reyes looks him over, studying him, like he’s a particularly complex math problem. “But I have plenty of agents who are good shots.” 

_ None as good as me, _he bites back, his pride baring its teeth and snarling. 

“Why else?” Reyes pushes once more, but Jesse’s not going to storm off this time. 

“Because you could smell blood in the water,” Jesse almost growls, his voice low and filled with fury. He was playing nice a moment ago, but he’s tired. He’s so fucking tired of this mentor bullshit where Reyes pretends that they aren’t born enemies, that he hadn’t taken _ everything _ from him. “Because you thought you could be some fuckin’ _ savior _ and that I’d be _ grateful_, that I’d be indebted to you, that I’d be another one of your fuckin’ precious agents that worship the ground you walk on,” he spits out. 

Reyes’s eyebrows shoot up the moment he starts talking, but that’s the only indication of his surprise. He doesn’t interrupt him, either. 

A beat passes where neither of them speak, where Jesse’s words hang in the air between them, thick and bitter. 

“I am not as powerful as you seem to think I am.” Reyes starts to push off the desk, to move closer, maybe, but then thinks better of it. This is just a relaxed discussion, after all. “I get why you’re angry—“

“No, you _ don’t.” _ Jesse storms forward, since Reyes is still pretending it’s all nice and cordial, bridging the gap between them until he’s in his face, just barely an inch shorter than him, and the realization just makes his lip curl. 

Reyes, to his credit, stands up straight and meets his eyes, his face just as calm and steady.

“You don’t get it. You took my whole fuckin’ life away and you expect me to be grateful to you? For throwin’ my friends in a cell and giving me some bullshit _ choice? _ You recruited me because it was a fucking power trip for you, _ that’s _why.” There’s an emotion he can’t name crawling up his throat, threatening to make itself known—a fragile kind of thing, something he dares not let Reyes see. Reyes only gets to see his anger—he does not get to see how badly he’s shaken. 

“Sit down.” The casual tone has slipped away, and Reyes’s eyes harden. “Now.” 

Jesse holds his gaze, and he stays rooted to the spot, for just a second, aching to hit him, to shove him, to do anything just so he can win this stupid fucking argument, but he knows. He knows it’s useless. He steps back, sets his jaw, and drops down onto the couch. His hands are shaking like he’s just had a fight—like there’s adrenaline still coursing through his veins, his heart pounding. 

Reyes grabs the desk chair and pulls it over, still sitting a good, respectable distance away, leaving room between them. Like that of a therapist and a patient, he thinks dimly. 

“I know that you’re angry, McCree,” he says, and Jesse once again feels a flicker of rage flare up in his chest, but he quiets it. 

“And you have made your reasoning _ very _ clear to me. But I gave you a choice. It wasn’t a good choice, but it was a choice, and it was the only one that I had the authority to give you. Is that clear?” 

There’s silence, Reyes’s eyes boring into him until Jesse realizes that he actually wanted him to answer him. “Yes, sir,” he replies, his voice dripping with venom. 

Reyes doesn’t immediately continue—he watches Jesse’s face for another moment, and lets out a quiet breath, deflating once again, with that weight on his shoulders that makes him look so much older. 

Jesse prefers it when he looks like that, he decides. When it’s not like he’s putting on an act. 

He looks down at his shaking hands and clasps them tightly together in his lap. He’s not scared—he’s just angry, but he still doesn’t want Reyes to see it. 

“I recruited you because you were clever.”

Jesse’s eyes snap back up to Reyes, narrowed, unsure of where he’s going with this. 

“You _ are _ clever, still, but you seem to forget that.” Reyes watches him, lingering on his hands, on the way Jesse’s fidgeting. “You have a natural talent for the kind of work we do, that much is clear, but you throw it away with impulsive decisions that are gonna get you killed one day. That nearly killed us both today.” 

The train’s horn is roaring in his ears, and Jesse looks down again, the guilt rising up once more when he remembers how the glass shattered, how the blood had turned to mist in the air when Reyes was hit. 

“I did not recruit you because I thought you would follow the rules. I recruited you because I believe that you know which rules to follow, to bend, or to break.” His tone isn’t quite softer, here, but it takes on a different kind of note that Jesse can’t name. “This is Blackwatch, McCree. This is far bigger than anything you’ve done before, and you can do good here. But only if you use your head.”

Jesse swallows the guilt in his throat—shoves it down and refuses to acknowledge it, though it’s all pounding around inside his skull. What does he want him to say to this? He doesn’t know how in hell he’s meant to react, and he takes a shaky breath and says absolutely nothing. 

“I expect you to push back,” Reyes continues, watching him closely. “I don’t want you to be a yes-man, or to fall in line with the rest of them. I know you won’t. All I ask is that when you do fight me, when you ignore my orders, you have a _ damn _ good reason for it. You didn’t have that tonight.” 

Silence. It stretches on for a moment, then another, and Jesse realizes he’s meant to reply here, too. “Okay,” he says, quietly, flatly, uncharacteristically. 

This conversation, or—argument, or—whatever it is has drained him more than he’d expected, and he feels just as tired as Reyes looks. Like now he’s got that same weight on his shoulders. 

_ Clever, _he’d said. The idea that Jesse’s made for this, that he’s somehow ended up in the right place—it nearly makes him laugh. It’s amazing that he’s made it this far already, tricking everyone into thinking he belongs here, but with Reyes thinking that he’s meant for this—it’s only a matter of time before they figure out he’s just very good at pretending. 

“I got angry,” Jesse mutters, not even sure if he wants Reyes to hear him. “That’s why.” 

Reyes tilts his head in a way that’s less.. judgmental, more curious. “That they were getting away?”

This is stupid. He doesn’t need to talk about this shit, not with Reyes, but he has the gnawing need to rationalize himself, to prove he’s not just—

Whatever Reyes thinks he is. 

Jesse looks down at his lap, shaking his head slightly. “I don’t know. I guess.” 

There’s a long moment as Reyes considers that, then nods. With that, he pushes himself to his feet, drags the chair back and grabs his phone off the desk, checking whatever notifications have appeared. “You should get some rest,” Reyes says, his back to him. Casual, like they’ve not been arguing, like they’re friends. “I’ve got some more calls to make. We’ll head back to base in a few hours.”

Jesse watches him again, scrutinizing. Just how much of this is a show? How much is him pretending to care, playing nice, in hopes that Jesse will get over it? “Sure,” he says at last. 

And he does as he asks. He grabs his duffel bag and heads to the back room, eases the door shut and falls back onto the bed and lies there for a good long while, trying to sort out the thoughts flying through his head. It’s not easy, and he gives up on it quickly, too tired to care. But Reyes’s words linger. 

Natural talents and impulsive decisions—what else is new?

Recognition for it, maybe. He got lectured, but he didn’t get yelled at. It’s a much preferable alternative, of two things he’d thought always went together. 

He finds sleep, eventually. His dreams are filled with twisted metal skeletons of cars and an orchestra of gunfire, black and chrome motorcycles against gray asphalt and grinning skulls on leather jackets. Blood long dried on dusty yellow bandanas. 

When he opens his eyes again, sunlight is streaming through the blinds. Bits of dust float through the light, a quiet drift downwards, and Jesse watches it for a while, before he resigns himself to getting up for the rest of the day. 

They pack their things, and there’s not much conversation. Just a silence that’s not quite easy, not exactly comfortable, but it’s not tense, per say. Feels like they’re both in their own heads. 

Words are sticking on his tongue and it’s hard to break that silence, even though he wants to. Christ, he got him _ shot. _

“I’m sorry,” he finally manages. 

Reyes is doing one last sweep of the safe house to make sure they’ve not left anything behind, but he looks up at Jesse, his eyebrows raised. In surprise, maybe. 

_ What for_, Jesse can already hear him saying, in that annoying fucking tone, pushing for a proper apology that squarely paints Jesse as an insolent child. He already regrets saying it. 

Reyes nods once, and slings his own bag over his uninjured shoulder. “Thank you, McCree.” 

And that’s it. No more lectures, just the same silence that creeps back in, and a weight that’s been lifted off his shoulders. 

Nothing more is said. They head out, back to base, back to all the rules and regulations and to his punishment, which ends up being a two week suspension from field work. Not so bad, all things considered. 

Blackwatch, maybe, wouldn’t be so bad. 

**Author's Note:**

> come talk to me on my [tumblr!](https://mercurialmoon.tumblr.com)
> 
> title from [i'm not a saint by billy raffoul](https://youtu.be/ro5_Ur3kJPk)


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